Flight of Fools
by Echo the Insane
Summary: Severus Snape sits in the Shrieking Shack, thinking. Post HBP ficlet. HBP spoilers. One Shot.


Title: Flight of Fools

Author: Echo the Insane

Summary: Severus Snape sits in the Shrieking Shack, thinking. Post HBP ficlet.

Pairing: None

Rating: PG

WIP/Complete: Complete!

Disclaimer: I don't own Snape, Potter, Malfoy, or Dumbledore. In fact, I don't own anything. Not even my house – the one that caught fire. Really. My house caught fire a few days ago. Well, the kitchen ceiling did. Long story. No one died.

Severus Snape sat huddled in the corner of the broken down shack, his head hanging tiredly in his hands, his eyes stung from exhaustion and emotion. They had been on the run for days, moving from place to place under the cover of night. He had eaten nothing and slept little.

"_Please…Severus, please…"_

He winced at the memory, a strong pull of undeniable regret tugging behind his navel. His fingers began to tingle as the blood was slowly cut off. In the corner opposite his, Draco Malfoy sniffled.

Potter's angry eyes flashed before him, startling him with their clarity. He had seen it – his death – in those eyes. Potter would never understand.

"_Please…"_

The chains that bound Draco's ankle to the crumbling walls shifted as the boy tried to get more comfortable. The idiot boy had tried to run from him. Where would he go, with Aurors and Order members on the hunt for him? Severus glared briefly at him, but the boy seemed not to notice. He was pale, and there was still vomit stuck to the hem of his robe. Severus sneered and closed his eyes, wishing desperately to be back in his warm, comfy rooms at Hogwarts.

Albus' pleading eyes came to him, overlaying Potter's, which he knew then would never leave him neither in wakefulness or sleep. He felt ill again and heaved into his mouth. He managed not to show his discomfort, though he doubted Draco would have noticed if he had.

"_Coward…"_

Severus shivered, violently cold suddenly. He heard a distant trill of Phoenix song, and hesitantly opened his mind to it.

He was Fawkes, flying in high, wide circles over the white flames that soon became Dumbledore's coffin. His heart grieved as the song burst from the phoenix's beak. The phoenix floated sadly above, his eyes locking suddenly with the upturned gaze of Harry Potter.

He was no longer Fawkes. He was inside Potter. What he found frightened him.

Stillness. Utter calm. Determination…and power.

_Such Power!_ Power that the Dark Lord knew not.

"…What'd you reckon, Harry?" Weasley was asking.

"I'm not coming back even if it does reopen," Potter's voice replied calmly.

Weasley looked gob smacked, but Granger looked merely saddened. "I knew you were going to say that. But then what will you do?"

"I'm going back to the Dursleys' once more, because Dumbledore wanted me to. But it'll be a short visit, and then I'll be gone for good."

"But where will you go if you don't come back to school?"

"I thought I might go back to Godric's Hollow." He felt something stir in Potter, something that set Severus into a deep unease. "For me, it started there, all of it. I've just got a feeling I need to go there. And I can visit my parent's graves, I'd like that."

After that, there was talk of Horcruxes – _So there are multiple ones!_ – and Potter's destined journey to hunt them down and destroy them. Just as Severus was growing weary of Potter's mind, a small voice that was not his own said:

_Don't leave yet, Snape, old boy. There's something you need to hear._

"…I've got to go after the seventh bit of Voldemort's soul, the bit that's still in his body, and I'm the one who's going to kill him. And if I meet Severus Snape along the way, so much the better for me," a slight pause as Severus felt a dreadful cold swell up inside him, like icy fingers wrapping around his heart, trapping him, keeping him from escaping Potter's mind, "so much the worse for him."

_Yes, much worse for you, Severus. You'll rue the day you crossed me. I'm no Tom Riddle, true, _Potter's voice began in a calm, almost friendly voice. _No, no. I'm worse. Far worse. Just wait…and see. Next we meet, you'll learn just what real regret it._

There was a sudden air of dismissal. _Now, get out._

And Severus was forced out of Potter's mind with such power that his head bloomed with pain and blood spilt from his mouth as he re-entered his own body and mind.

Trembling, ignoring Draco's quiet, hesitant voiced concerns, Severus shivered in his corner, the blood drying on his lips and chin.

He had picked the wrong side, and now, he would live in fear up until the day of his death.

A day he half prayed would soon arrive.

A/N: Not beta'ed. I actually wrote this right after HBP came out. It's been sitting on my harddrive ever since. I just decided to post it, for fun mostly, and because I haven't posted in years... sheepish Don't judge it too harshly – I wrote it at 4AM after pulling an allnighter.


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